Jan Jansz Mostaert, Portrait of an African Man (Christophle le More?), c. 1525 - c. 1530. oil on panel, painted surface: height 30 cm x width 20.3 cm; support: height 30.8 cm x width 21.2 cm. Rijksmuseum, Purchased with the support of the Vereniging Rembrandt, with additional funding from the Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds, the Mondriaan Stichting, the VSBfonds, the BankGiro Lottery and the Rijksmuseum Fonds. Public domain (Public Domain Mark).

Portrait of an African Man (Christophle le More?)

Jan Jansz Mostaert, c. 1525 - c. 1530. oil on panel.

Three-quarter view
Soft light
Painting

Half-length, head turned three-quarters to the left with the gaze off to the left, softly modeled by light from the left against a blue-green ground.

Open in the value study maker

The image is free to use for any purpose: the museum has released it into the public domain.

Value studies

Portrait of an African Man (Christophle le More?) as a study in 2 values — **Notan, 2 values.** Split at value 2.8: 90% of the picture is dark and 10% light.

Portrait of an African Man (Christophle le More?) as a study in 3 values — **3 values.** 73% dark (values 0 to 1.7), 23% middle (1.7 to 4.1) and 4% light (4.1 to 10).

Portrait of an African Man (Christophle le More?) as a study in 5 values — **5 values.** From darkest to lightest: 36%, 38%, 17%, 6% and 3% of the picture.

Split at the picture's natural breaks between light and dark, with Simplify at 5, as in the value study maker. Values run from 0 (black) to 10 (white).

Palette

#181512Value 0.7, neutral
33%
#172825Value 1.5, neutral
26%
#321611Value 1.1, warm
13%
#4C1510Value 1.6, warm
11%
#573625Value 2.6, warm
8%
#825D41Value 4.3, warm
4%
#BBA184Value 6.8, warm
3%
#7F2A0EValue 3.0, warm
2%

The 8 main colors run from value 0.7 to 6.8: 6 warm and 2 neutral. See warm and cool colors for how the labels are worked out.

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